It Takes two - Broken

[dizzojay]

BROKEN

Rating: K+
Genre: angst, hurt/comfort
Characters: Sam and Dean Winchester
Spoilers/Warnings: none
Word Count: 420
Disclaimer: don't own them

Sometimes, it's not the physical injuries that hurt the most.

Fumbling blindly in the dark, Sam became increasingly agitated as he tried to unlock the motel room door. He wasn't sure if it was the darkness or his shaking hand that made such a simple job so damned difficult, and he really didn't care. He simply sagged with relief as the key slid home and the door swung open with a grinding squeak.

"C'mon dude," he whispered into the damp, spiky scalp pressed against his cheek, not expecting a response and receiving only a muffled grunt for his trouble.

Stumbing through the room, his barely conscious brother half-leaning, half-carried alongside him, Sam headed through into the bathroom and paused to carefully sit Dean down on the closed toilet seat. He cursed the moment that he had allowed his brother to talk him into setting foot in the local bar. That skeevy dive had had trouble written all over it; not the usual 'oh, this is awkward' sort of trouble, but the 'two psycho rednecks down a dark alleyway' sort of trouble.

Kneeling down in front of Dean, he made of point of staring straight up into the unfocussed eyes which gazed back at him from under rapidly closing lids, mismatched pupils adding to the general air of disorientation. "Y'gonna be okay while I go an' close the door?, he whispered.

Dean nodded slowly, "y-yeah," he grunted breathlessly, his voice slurring over a foamy trickle of blood that escaped his lips, "th-thanks S'mmy.".

xxxxx

Suppressing a deep breath, Dean groaned as he pressed a warm facecloth against his reddening battered ribs, and leaned weakly against the wall as Sam began to clean up the blood around his snuffling, smashed nose, softly rinsing the matted, drying bloodstains around his cheekbone and jaw.

Sam swore beneath his breath as he tried without success to find an undamaged spot to hold Dean's face still, wanting so much to rain down the agonies of hell on the bastards who did this. He muttered soft and meaningless reassurances as he worked, the water in the sink turning a faint pink as he rinsed the facecloth again and again.

He felt sick as the process gradually uncovered the vicious damage to his brother's handsome face, broken and brutalised beyond recognition.

"Sorry, bro'," he whispered, taking Dean's clenched hand and ghosting his thumb over the grazed knuckles.

xxxxx

Sam may have been undamaged, but he was still in unbearable pain.

He knew Dean had taken this beating willingly to stop those assholes going after him.

xxxxx

end